A man lies alone on a bed of discarded clothes. The rumbling noise that sits in the air of the starkly white box space is so low and deep that it feels more of the mind than the ears; I see a man rubbing his temples as the volume increases and the play begins. This image and sound, along with the story we are told of the boy who is scolded for writing with his left hand, are the things that stay in the mind to make you think, long after this play ends.The man lying along onstage is a refugee, fleeing his country because of his sexuality. This play looks at not only a national story, but a personal story of desire, fear, and shame. The man speaks of himself almost entirely in third person through the piece, demonstrating the way that the facts of his past leave him struggling to connect with himself and to associate the awful story he narrates with his life. He repeatedly claims that he has forgotten what happened to him, although by the end it is clear that he remembers all too well.It’s a horribly, sorrowfully engaging premise, and Jamie Bradley plays this dislocated man without falter. Although the third-person narration is hard to criticise in terms of its implication, as a theatrical tool it can sit on the edge of unrelatability. The moments when the man speaks of himself as ‘I’ are (admittedly by contrast) powerful to the extreme.The story of this piece, based on a real man’s experiences, is undeniably touching, harrowing, and quieting by turns. And while the piece is acted with great sensitivity and nuance, this pared-down style of show will not suit everyone. And, while his solitude and third-person narration have important meaning, it’s hard not to wonder how utterly brilliant this show could be with a cast to play the people he loved and lost.
